And Thunder in the Sky
by TheMacUnleashed
Summary: Dean wakes up to something vastly different than what he last saw. A two-shot version of Dean's first hours in Hell.
1. Chapter 1

**Title: **And Thunder in the Sky  
**Summary: **Dean wakes up to something vastly different than what he last saw. Two-shot.  
**Characters: **Dean, Alastair**  
Warnings: **The second chapter will contain torture, although nothing overly graphic. Bad language.  
**Disclaimer: **All Kripke's creations. And for what it's worth, the title is from Meatloaf's _Bat out of Hell. _I like the irony.

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"Now what have we here? Seems like the hellhounds have dragged in something better than their usual trash and scum. Maybe they're finally earning their keep."

A low voice; raspy, and with something of a lisp, brought Dean to life.

Or death. Hell.

He squeezed his eyes shut; clenched them like it would help in his struggle to bridge together the fragmented pieces of what he remembered with what was going on now.

Pain. He remembered that; feeling claws and teeth that he couldn't see, but that he could tell were friggin' _long _dig into him, piercing through his skin and then ripping into the muscle and the flesh beneath. He could remember hearing snarling, and Sam shouting above it.

And after that... he could remember only in the very vague sense that he knew that there _was_ an "after that;" something that linked his final memories on Earth with wherever he was now. Had there been a reaper, or was it the hellhounds that had actually guided him down below? He didn't know.

For the first time, he really assessed his condition. He was lying on his back, his wrists chained above his head in thick, cold metal shackles, while his ankles were secured down in clasps that bit into his skin. He could feel something below him, supporting his back at the same time as it dug painfully into his skin.

It was probably important to note, though, that he was whole again. Whatever the hellhounds had done to him, it apparently wasn't lasting, since he couldn't feel the all-too-familiar spread of blood over his stomach and abdomen. Even his clothes were in better shape then they had been on Earth. At least he looked good.

A faint scent of sulfur lingered in the air -but that was hardly surprising. He might as well get used to the unique odor that wafted around Hell's most prominent population; it wasn't like it would be going away anytime soon.

Forcing open his eyes, he saw that it was entirely dark around him; no fires to lighten up the place at all. Dean couldn't see who -or what- had spoken. In fact, he couldn't even see what was binding him down, or what he was bound to. For all that it was worth, he could have kept his eyes shut and not missed anything. That was a mildly unsettling conclusion to come to, but it wasn't as bad as he had feared.

From somewhere behind him, the voice spoke again. "I know it's a bit dark right now, but we'll have plenty of time for fire and brimstone later, my boy. I took the liberty of studying you a bit on Earth, and I figured you'd prefer the more... personalized experience the first time around." There was a hint of amusement in the voice, a strong implication of a laugh that refused to materialize, and that somehow made it seem more menacing.

More menacing, yeah, but Dean wasn't scared. Not yet. As the voice had said, there would be plenty of time for that later.

"You want to tell me who you are?" He was relieved to learn that, along with his other senses, his voice was doing fine.

This time, he _did_ get a full laugh, slow and rough and plenty damned unsettling in its own right. "I guess you are at a bit of a disadvantage here. After all, I know _you_, Dean Winchester. I'd say I know all about you."

"Yeah, well; I think I'm going to take a wild guess and say that you don't know anything about me, you demonic son of a bitch. Not one thing." He tugged his wrist, testing his limitations, but wasn't surprised to find out that he wouldn't be going anywhere soon. He was bound firmly in place (wherever that place might have been) and the metallic cuffs seemed to bite into his wrists and tighten when he tried to move his arms.

The laugh that he got in response was lower than the one before; more of a purr, really, and creepy as Hell -no pun intended. "Good, Dean. Very good. Just as defiant that I knew you would be."

A hand slipped forward from somewhere behind him and came to rest on his shoulder. He flinched involuntarily at it, as he felt long fingers that ended in sharp, curved claws press down over his shirt. "So here's the deal, Deano. The name is Alastair, and I'll be your guide to Hell. I might even give you a tour now and then. You see, Dean-" the hand pressed down possessively "-I could use a bit of new blood down here. An apprentice, of sorts. Someone to help continue my legacy." He gave a low chuckle at that. "Not that I'll be leaving anytime soon -but it's nice to see that I've left a positive influence in my wake. Any demon _could _perform my work, after all, even if they didn't do quite as thorough a job as I would have. I want something special."

"Right. And what is it that you do?"

"I spend my days occupying Hell's residents; the old and the new alike. Torture, you'd probably say, although that really is such an ugly little word. I prefer to think of myself as an artist. I carve people into new and different things." Something sharp and cool -could've been a finger or a claw; could have been a knife- stroked the back of his neck. "Or sew them together. Or... well, you'll learn."

"Okay, let me see if I've got this straight. You want me to just say that I'm going to be your bitch and torture people, 'cause that's the sort of person that I am. Sorry, I think I'll have to pass on this one." Whoever said that demons didn't have a sense of humor had no idea what they were talking about, since this guy had to be joking. "Go to Hell."

"I'd be impressed at your deft ability to crack a joke beneath the circumstances -but I've heard that one before. Most people start out like that. A bit of rebellion's not too bad a thing, though. I can usually paint over it really quick, see." A tongue flickered out and traced over and around his ear. "But I guess that's a no? Are you sure?" He gave a soft sign, the sort of one you heard from an older man as he watched a boy commit some naive mistake.

"Yeah, I guess so." Dean twisted his arms, uncomfortably aware of the demon's presence behind him. The shackles were definitely getting tighter.

"All the more fun for me, I suppose." Alastair's breath quickened. "Are you ready for some good old family entertainment, my boy?"

"Bite me."

Alastair threw back his head and gave a howling laugh. It was swept and carried around by some wind Dean couldn't feel; echoed and bounced off walls he couldn't see. "Let the fun begin."


	2. Chapter 2

There was something like a lightening flash, or maybe a series of them that flashed milliseconds apart in a blinding strobe that made Dean instinctively want to lift his arms to shield his eyes. However, since his hands were, at the moment, chained in an arm-numbing position, he settles for the lesser alternative of squeezing them closed, letting a scarlet curtain flash in place of the dark one.

When he opened them, it was lighter.

No, that wasn't the right term. He could see now, yeah, but it wasn't _light_. He hadn't been blind before; it was more like he had seen darkness itself an actual presence that had slipped in and wrapped itself over the surroundings, muffling the details in a heavy blanket. And now, at Alastair's say, it had scattered apart like a sand dune breaking in a hurricane.

What came in place of the Darkness was nighttime, or something damned close to it. A sky, stormy and cloudless, stretched out around him, above and below-

Oh, _fuck_.

It had been better before, when he hadn't know where he was. Then, he'd had nothing in particular to be making his nervous –besides that it was Hell, and all.

Now he could see where he was, and what was below him: nothing. He was strung up in some chain version of a spider's web, which somehow shone stark, sharp silver against the nighttime.

This was worse than flying. At least when he was on an airplane, he had the choice to save himself the puking time, and just not look out the window; the option to make himself blind to what was going on.

"Do you like it? I designed it with your personal interests in mind." Light and mocking, the voice came from behind him.

Dean was going to try to twist around and see the face of the bastard he was up against, but the demon saved him the trouble. Nimbly, Alastair stepped out from behind Dean and walked casually along the  
crisscrossed wires until he was facing his victim. Curling his lips back in a madman's grin he spread out his arms and said, "Take a good look, my boy. I already got a peek while you were recovering from the journey that brought you down here in the first place. But this… this is your first real chance to let your pretty eyes look over me. Won't be your last, of course, but why not try to enjoy it anyway?"

Dean narrowed his eyes, glaring fiercely like it would somehow help improve the situation, but he kept strong. He didn't let himself turn away from the grotesquely twisted visage –not that he had much of a choice, physically speaking, but even if he had been free to move as he pleased, he had not spent twenty-five years of his life as a hunter just to turn around with his tail tucked between his legs at the first sight of a demon.

Even if what he was staring at wasn't the face of what he'd been taught to fight; the blank, fill-in-the-details mannequin of some hapless vessel. The few demons whose faces he bore witness to in his final hours on Earth weren't nearly enough to have prepared him for the sight of a demon who didn't bother to hide his true face (and why should he? Dean had never stuck a paper bag over his head whenever he upon going out on Earth).

Alastair looked over him with white, pupil-less eyes, and although it was hard to imagine any emotion showing on the skin that looked like rotting meat, the demon was still able to convey an unsettling amount of eagerness. "Well? Think you've seen enough? Anytime you want, prettyboy, you can just say yes and jumpstart your new career."

He refused to respond to that, or to acknowledge the indignity of being called "prettyboy," although he wasn't so stoic that he was above wishing for him to have some semblance of liquid in his mouth, because at the moment the idea of spitting on the face of that godforsaken _thing_ was one of the most satisfying things he could think of.

If Alastair was put-off by Dean's silence, he didn't show it. Instead he just snapped his fingers and grinned as Dean watched a blade suddenly appear in his hands.

It was a knife –no, a razor, and not the kind the Gillette made. Long and sharp, it glinted in the darkness, reflecting some unseen light.

"The first thing you need to learn," drawled Alastair, "is that there's no death in Hell." He stepped forwards and grasped Dean's chin with the hand that wasn't holding the blade. "That's an important thing to know, if you ask me. You've got to realize that no matter what I do, there is no release." He brought his hand up in a sharp, swift arc and sliced through Dean's throat.

It was all done in one gesture, and he didn't have time to scream as the blade tore through skin and arteries. He could only stare at the demon, eyes unable to close as he choked on the hot blood that slid down in streams on his skin, and in rivers down his throat.

Alastair smirked and moved his hand from holding Dean's chin to pressing down on the wound. "Y'see what I'm saying now?" The skin knitted itself back together beneath the clawed fingers and Dean was able to breathe again, but he could still feel the sticky blood drying on his skin and shirt. "There's no easy way out here, except for you to accept that generous little offer I'm making."

"Good thing than, 'cause everyone knows that only cowards take the easy way out –and if you think that I will ever be cowering at your feet, than you have got another thing coming." It was odd, how his voice sounded almost exactly the same as it always did when he had a dry mouth, even though he'd been bleeding out with his vocal cords probably slit only moments before. Funny how some things didn't change.

Alastair's smirk widened, and he laid a hand on Dean's right shoulder. With the other hand, he moved the blood-coated razor blade so that it was pressing against Dean's right bicep, piercing through the cloth of his shirt. Gripping the blade he tore it across through the cloth, until it rested in the center of Dean's collarbone. "Dean, Dean, Dean. Let's not get ahead of ourselves, hmm? The day's not over quite yet." With a casual flick of his wrist the blade was drawn downwards, tearing open his shirt.

Alastair's hands, and the razor that they clutched, pressed against Dean's bare chest, and in the sky thunder raged on, almost –but not quite- drowning out the screams as Hell's greatest artist began his next masterpiece.

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_A/n: reviews are very much appreciated -I'm not very experienced in this fandom, and I'm trying to improve, so any advice would be wonderful._


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